PARIS AGREEMENT : THE END OF THE AGE OF FOSSIL FUELS

On 12 December 2015, the 21st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) adopted the Paris Agreement. The Historic city of
Paris, thus finally concluded the long process of crafting a new international climate regime that
began with the adoption of the Bali Roadmap in 2007, failed spectacularly in Copenhagen 2009,
and resumed with a new approach in Durban 2011. The conference in Paris concluded this
process, as demanded in the Durban Platform, with the adoption of a treaty under international
law that represents the first really collective effort by the world community to tackle climate
change.

The Convention's objective is to avoid dangerous climate change, the Paris Agreement now
posits that any global warming is dangerous. Furthermore, countries agreed that the temperature
limit is to be reached by, first, a peaking of greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible and,
second, a balance between anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of
greenhouse gases in the second half of this century.

The Paris Agreement build upon the Convention and for the first time brought all nations into a
common cause to undertake ambitious efforts to combat climate change and adapt to its effects,
with enhanced support to assist developing countries to do so. As such, it charts a new course in
the global climate effort.

Maintaining the constructive spirit throughout the fortnight of negotiations was not least the
result of the extraordinary leadership provided by the French Presidency. The team consisting of
Ministers and Diplomats in Paris had meticulously studied the failure of Copenhagen as well as
the much more successful negotiations in Cancun and Durban.
Six diplomatic maneuvers viz-a-viz., Laying the early grounds of negotiation, early invitation to
the heads of the States to kick off the talks, ensuring participation and transparency, embracing
potential critics, the adoptive policies and impeccable environment helped to ensure the success
of the Paris talks.
With many developing countries already experiencing impacts of climate change, for many
years, they have made efforts to raise the status of adaptation in the climate regime, which has
historically been put in second place by developed countries. For developing countries to
effectively implement their nationally determined contributions, industrialised countries will
have to offer assistance in various forms.

While the Paris Agreement may easily be criticised for setting ambitious objectives but failing to
actually deliver, any assessment of the Paris Agreements needs to be based on an understanding
of what international processes can actually deliver. The positions countries take internationally
are determined by their domestic political situations. International negotiations can therefore
rarely take decisions that have not previously been prepared nationally. As countries are
sovereign, that is, they have nobody above them to enforce rules, international agreements can
only go as far as what countries are prepared to do. The current situation is that in most key
countries there is as yet no appetite to undergo the fundamental economic and ecologic
transformation that is necessary.

The role the international climate process can in the meantime play is to serve as a key catalyst
for these national discussions by keeping the issue on the agenda and forcing national policy
makers to continuously revisit it. The Paris Agreement was never going to deliver the emission
reductions necessary for keeping global warming below 2 C it never could, given the current
political realities in the major emitting countries. The new agreement may not ensure that each
country progresses at the same speed, but it does make sure that everybody turns to the right
direction. This direction is provided by the long-term goal to keep global mean temperature rise
"well below 2 C", which was inscribed prominently into Article 2 of the Treaty.

The sense of urgency of the 2 C goal was never beyond question to those familiar with
mitigation scenario modelling exercises compiled by the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change), but it may still have linguistically created a comfort zone and a sense of
remaining flexibility that was never justified. The ultimate objective of the Convention is to
avoid dangerous climate change; the Paris Agreement now posits that any global warming is
dangerous.
The Copenhagen conference was deemed a diplomatic disaster and in the aftermath many
doubted whether the multilateral process under the United Nation Framework Convention on
Climate Change could be effective at all in leveraging international climate cooperation. The
Cancun Agreements demonstrated that Parties were willing to continue meaningful negotiations.
Still, progress was painstakingly slow and frustrated. Admist this, Paris was probably the last
chance for environmental multilateralism to demonstrate its ability to deliver meaningful results.
While the Paris Agreement is far from perfect and little has been achieved in the process of
transforming unsustainable socioeconomic systems into sustainable ones, it still has exceeded the
expectations.

Among the debates going on relating to the exit of U.S. from Paris Agreement, the next years
will show whether the world community is willing to seriously tackle the challenges of a global
transformation. The turn-around from the fossil-based development path is still possible, but
requires immediate implementation and the strengthening of national contributions already from
2018. It requires transformative policies in almost all fields energy, transport, industrial
processes, housing, agriculture and land-use in general. Politics, economic sector, civil society
and science all have the responsibility to make utopia possible: a sustainable planet for
everybody.